Title: The Family Upstairs
Author: Lisa Jewell
Publisher: Atria Books
Release Date: November 5, 2019
Pages: 349
Book Source: NetGalley
“Be careful who you let in.
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Soon after her twenty-fifth birthday, Libby Jones returns home from work to find the letter she’s been waiting for her entire life. She rips it open with one driving thought: I am finally going to know who I am.
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She soon learns not only the identity of her birth parents, but also that she is the sole inheritor of their abandoned mansion on the banks of the Thames in London’s fashionable Chelsea neighborhood, worth millions. Everything in Libby’s life is about to change. But what she can’t possibly know is that others have been waiting for this day as well—and she is on a collision course to meet them.
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Twenty-five years ago, police were called to 16 Cheyne Walk with reports of a baby crying. When they arrived, they found a healthy ten-month-old happily cooing in her crib in the bedroom. Downstairs in the kitchen lay three dead bodies, all dressed in black, next to a hastily scrawled note. And the four other children reported to live at Cheyne Walk were gone.” – Amazon
Jessica’s Review
After I read Lisa Jewell’s Then She was Gone all I wanted was another book from her. When I saw The Family Upstairs was coming out, I immediately went to NetGalley to see if I could get my hands on a copy and I did!
If you’ve listened to the podcast (@booksdontreviewthemselves) that I do with my friend Kim, you would know I am an avid thriller reader. Apparently I like having anxiety 24/7.
This book is not one that I would consider “thrilling” per se, but definitely more of a suspenseful read. I found the premise for this book to be very intriguing. I don’t have the experience nor have I read a lot of books that essentially focus on cult living.
I thought the writing was excellent and the book flowed very nicely. Libby Jones takes you on a journey to find out who she really is and how she came to be. In that journey, you meet other characters along the way that help her piece together a life she never really knew existed. You learn about a cult that left people dead, but it never really left me feeling horrified. At some point, the characters that were killed off were, dare I say, deserving. Lisa Jewell did an amazing job developing the characters to the point there were a few that I didn’t mind seeing go. She also did really well her underline themes involving the power and control that money, sex, and drugs really play on a person.
Sounds interesting? Meet Libby at 16 Cheyne Walk and see for yourself.
I did find myself wanting to know what would happen next and I definitely enjoyed the book, but it didn’t leave me with that book hangover that Then She was Gone did. Will I be reading more Lisa Jewell? ABSOLUTELY!
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